Food: End of Line Packaging

End of Line Packaging in the Food Industry

At the end of the line, packed cases are palletized for shipping. The flow of packed cases to the palletizer and assembled pallets leaving for shipping must be regulated to prevent line slowdowns and stoppages. The presence and position of empty pallets being introduced to the system must be confirmed. Palletizers, conveyors and other equipment must be safeguarded to protect personnel from accident or injury.

Banner products solve problems at the end of the line. Banner sensors featuring on/off delay timers monitor and regulate the flow of packed cases into the assembly and palletizing areas. Banner safety light curtains guard pallet in-feed and assembled pallet retrieval areas, and protect all access points to the palletizer. E-Stop buttons are deployed throughout the palletizing area and rope-pull switches along the conveyors enable staff to shut-down equipment in an emergency. Safety controllers simplify and centralize the management of all deployed safety devices.

Baking is a mixture of creativity, precision and attention to detail. The Wilkinson Baking Company has added technical innovation to the mix. The Wilkinson Bread Bakery is a compact, completely self-contained and fully automated bread bakery. This unique machine combines technology with tradition to transform simple raw ingredients into bakery fresh bread at 40 loaves an hour.

The dough for one of the company’s many popular breakfast cereals must fall within specific height parameters to ensure that it will have the perfect flake. Dough that is too thick will emerge from baking stiff and heavy. Dough that is too thin will crumble easily. This impacts the quality, taste and texture of the final product as well as product weight and packaging. Any product that does not meet the rigorous quality standards of the company will not be shipped or sold on the consumer market.

The bakery’s multi-staged baking process begins with mixing, kneading and fermentation and completes with proofing, baking and cooling. At each stage, experienced bakers perform quality checks for appearance, texture, size and weight. Loaves that do not meet the company’s standards are rejected for consumer sales. The company needed to build-in system capabilities to help them better manage their resources and maintain quality standards.

A US producer of authentic Mexican foods, such as tortillas and tostadas, strives to provide the best-tasting and freshest products for its consumers. In order to achieve this goal, consistency on the packaging line is key.
The company was looking for a way to eliminate inconsistencies in their tortillas. Because they did not have a way to continuously monitor dough thickness on the production line, the dough nips often turned out either too high or too low, resulting in irregular tortilla sizes and weights. If a package of tortillas is under weight, it must be scrapped. In order to help eliminate waste and improve product consistency, the company worked with Banner to find a monitoring solution.

The EPA has placed restrictions on the use of many fumigants citing a correlation between their use and ozone depletion. As an alternative, a large-scale flour mill performs three to four thermal remediations per year to eradicate flour beetles. The temperature inside the mill is brought up to 122° F (50° C). This is done gradually to minimize equipment and building strain caused by heat expansion.